For a while we’ve been saying that Fido is going to start selling BlackBerry devices and services, and now it looks like the company is finally ready take the leap. Fido reps and CSRs have been told that BlackBerry is on its way and training will begin sometime next week. Good news, right? Maybe not at first. Quite a few Fido employees have told us that Fido is going make the Pearl 8100 its first available device. We’re hoping that this isn’t the case and Fido is full steam ahead with the 8220, but there just might be something to it. RIM declared the 8100 was at the end of its life over a year ago meaning that production has stopped and Fido should not be able to order any. However, it is possible that Fido could take on whatever 8100s its parent company Rogers hasn’t been able to sell, have the Fido logo slapped on the antenna cover, get a box printed up and call it a day. The problem with that option is that when booting up the phone a Rogers logo would appear as it’s burnt into the firmware. Sure, Fido could use the VSM tool to swap in a Fido logo but that would be so much work considering it would need to upgrade all 8100s from OS 4.2.1 to 4.5. Time will tell, but at least BlackBerry is looking closer than ever for Fido users.
